Cliff Battles is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Although he was born in Akron and raised in Kenmore, a lot of lifelong residents don’t recognize his name.
Joe Francis IV is trying to change that.
Francis, 66, a Canal Fulton resident who grew up in Kenmore, is astonished when he asks people about Battles. About 90 percent of the time, they haven’t heard of him.
“A Kenmore High School person is in the hall of fame and nobody really knows it,” he said. “So I’m kind of on a mission to make this known.”
For Francis, it’s personal. His father, Joe Francis III, was best buddies with Battles when they were kids. If it hadn’t been for that friendship, sports history might not have been made.
The boys were born in 1910 and lived several blocks apart in Kenmore when it was a separate city from Akron.
Cliff resided at 2134 13th St. SW with his parents, Della and Frank W. Battles, while Joe lived at 1168 Kenmore Blvd. with his parents, Kate and Joe Francis Jr.
“My grandmother and grandfather used to tell me that all them kids did was play ball,” Francis recalled. “All day, every day.”
In sandlots, fields and streets, the boys competed in baseball, football and basketball. They thunked tennis balls off garage doors and smacked golf balls across lawns.
They even took Kate Francis’ clothes prop, dug a hole in the backyard and pole-vaulted over the clothes line.
“They were sports obsessed,” he said.
Cliff Battles was nicknamed “Gip” after his childhood hero, George Gipp, who played football for Notre Dame.
However, Frank Battles wanted his son to focus on music, not sports. Cliff played tuba in the Kenmore marching band. His physique was considered too puny for athletics until he hit a growth spurt near the end of his sophomore year.
Joe, a star halfback for Kenmore, coaxed his buddy to try out for the team that summer.
“My dad grabbed Gip and said: ‘Listen, Cliff, you’re too damn big to be in the band. You need to come out for football,’ ” Francis said.
Cliff went home and asked his mother, Della, who gave him permission to play sports after smoothing it out with her husband. She told her son that if he wanted to be an athlete, he had to work on his agility, so she had him run each day.
“ ‘Gip’ began his football career back in 1926 as a member of the Kenmore High School team,” the Akron Times-Press reported in 1933. “He wasn’t considered much of a ball carrier then. In fact, he spent most of this time blocking for Joe Francis and the other Kenmore ball-carrying stars.”
Gradually, Battles adjusted. He grew to 6-1 and 195 pounds and joined the basketball team, too, competing against such Trolley League foes as Cuyahoga Falls, Kent Roosevelt, Ravenna, Bedford and Kent State High School. Then he became team captain.
After graduating in June 1927, Battles won a scholarship to West Virginia Wesleyan College in Buckhannon, W.Va.
According to Francis family lore, the boys hitchhiked all the way to West Virginia without telling their parents.
“This little school they never heard of,” Francis said. “So they went out in Kenmore and stuck their thumb out,” Francis said. “They decided together ‘Let’s go check this place out.’ ”
Three days later, the telephone rang at the Francis home. Joe and Cliff had made it to campus, but they ran out of cash and needed a ride home.
“My dad caught hell on the phone,” Francis said.
His grandfather drove to West Virginia to pick them up.
A Phi Beta Kappa scholar, Cliff Battles became a star athlete at West Virginia Wesleyan, setting a college record by winning 15 varsity letters in five sports: four each in football and track, three each in basketball and baseball and one in tennis.
In 1931, the All-American rushed for 15 touchdowns and led the nation in scoring.
Joe Francis III also received a scholarship to West Virginia Wesleyan, but it was rescinded after he broke an ankle in practice. As he told his son in later years, it was like being a horse with a broken leg. He no longer was wanted.
He returned to Akron, found a job at B.F. Goodrich and built tires for 42 years.
Battles was eligible to be a Rhodes Scholar after graduating from West Virginia Wesleyan in 1932, but he decided to play pro football. He joined the Boston Braves, which soon changed their name to the Boston Redskins. When the team moved to Washington in 1937, Battles went along with it.
He rushed for 3,511 yards in a six-year career. He was the NFL rushing champion of 1932 and 1937 and was the first player to gain more than 200 yards in a single game in 1933.
Battles and quarterback Sammy Baugh led the Redskins to a 28-21 win over the Chicago Bears in the 1937 NFL championship game.
The halfback earned $3,000 a year with the Redskins — about $48,500 today. When owner George Preston Marshall refused to give him a raise, Battles retired in 1937.
He served as an assistant football coach at Columbia University and later became basketball coach, too. During World War II, he served in the Marines. Afterward, he coached the Brooklyn Dodgers of the All-America Football Conference in 1946-47.
Then he quit football.
Battles went to work for General Electric in Washington, D.C., as manager of customer relations. He remained at GE until retiring in 1965.
Meanwhile, Joe Francis III built tires in Akron and coached Little League in Kenmore. He was one of the co-founders of the Kenmore Pee Wee football team in the late 1950s.
“He was really instrumental in youth sports in Kenmore,” his son said. “Everybody knew him.”
In 1968, Battles entered the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Francis happened to be home on leave while serving in the Air Force during the Vietnam War. He remembers his dad telling him: “We’ve got to go down to Canton.”
On the eve of induction, Cliff Battles had invited his old pal to be a guest at the Enshrinees Civic Dinner at the Moonlight Ballroom at Meyers Lake.
“Of course, I’ll never forget this because I’m so proud of being there that evening,” Francis said.
Guests were seated at round tables when Battles was introduced to a cheering crowd.
“He walked up to microphone,” Francis recalled. “He didn’t say ‘Good evening,’ he didn’t say ‘I’m Gip Battles.’ His very first words: ‘Where’s Joe Francis?’ And that was my father. He made him stand up and he said: ‘I would have never played organized football if it wasn’t for this man.’ ”
After dinner, Francis met his father’s friend for the first and only time. “It was just a bunch of chaos,” he said. “They hugged each other and my dad introduced me.”
They shook hands and exchanged pleasantries. Francis returned to the Air Force the next day with a greater appreciation of his father.
Cliff Battles was 70 years old in 1981 when he died of stroke complications in Florida. His pal Joe Francis III died in 1994 at 83.
In 1990, Kenmore High School began presenting the Cliff Battles Award to students who letter in three sports their senior year. More than 60 students have earned the honor.
Kenmore High is located off Battles Avenue, but surprisingly, the street is not named for the football star. It was there before he became famous, probably named for relatives.
Today, more people know the street than the athlete. Francis will continue to raise awareness about Cliff Battles.
“I just think it’s a shame that people in Akron don’t know there’s an Akron guy in the hall of fame,” he said.
Copy editor Mark J. Price is author of The Rest Is History: True Tales From Akron’s Vibrant Past, a book from the University of Akron Press. He can be reached at 330-996-3850 or mjprice@thebeaconjournal.com.